The Chemistry between Fiction and Reality: The Millions Interviews Ramona Ausubel

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There are lots of conversations in the world about writing which focus on the benefit of the reader and what works for him or her, and of course all writers should care about that, but at the same time, the magic act of making something out of nothing is happening in the writer’s head, and it’s that brain that needs to be tended to first.
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Capturing the Complexities of Time & Place: Ru Freeman

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I don’t like hierarchies, I don’t like the notion of the exalted thinker/writer who gazes from a distance. I don’t like people writing about worms without spending some time taking in the worm’s view of life.
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The Space Between: The Millions Interviews Marisa Silver

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A photograph captures a moment of time, but then time itself moves past that moment into the future. When we look at a photograph, we are looking at time stilled, at a moment that has died.
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Eat, Drink, and Read Mary: The Millions Interviews Mary Roach

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I think digestion is another lurid, taboo subject -- particularly from the navel down. But even what goes on in the mouth is an unthinkable, revolting thing that no one wants to think about. There was a sense that this was right up my stinky little alley.
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When Sylvia Was A Millie: An Interview With Elizabeth Winder

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The whole Sylvia Plath life story has been approached in a reductionist way. I wanted to do something different. Because when I read her journals I see someone who’s so lively, so hungry for life, and really engaged in the world in a relatable way.
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Is There a Truth and Does it Matter? An Interview with Tanis Rideout

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I always assume everything that I read is fiction, even if it’s in the non-fiction section. The very notion of putting something on paper means that you are creating a narrative.
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Liberating the Essay: A Conversation with Michelle Orange

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When I realized that they were really going to let me do whatever I wanted to do, I was like, “Well, shit, let me rethink this...”
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Living a Lie: The Millions Interviews Amity Gaige

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Surround yourself with trustworthy people, put your knife between your teeth, unplug, stop talking, and write.
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Reading for Instructions on How to Live: The Millions Interviews Suzanne Scanlon

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I feel like various dead writers are dear friends of mine -- from Woolf to Plath to Duras to DFW -- their lives and lessons and warnings and urgings are constantly informing my own, challenging my own.
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To Tell the Truth and Not Die: The Millions Interviews Elissa Schappell

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The laughing reader doesn’t feel the knife until it’s in his chest. The reader who is laughing at something they don’t think they should be laughing at experiences a catharsis. I’d argue that’s more valuable than providing someone with an orgasm.
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Literature as Self-Defense: An Interview with James Lasdun

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In 2003, Lasdun taught a course in creative writing at a college in New York. His most gifted student was an Iranian-born woman in her early 30s. They emailed back and forth, and an online friendship began to develop. The book is an exploration of the effects of this relationship turning sour. Give Me Everything You Have is a harrowing account of what it’s like to have someone expend a great deal of time and energy on the project of damaging your life for no immediately obvious reason.
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The Most Monstrous Version of Yourself: The Millions Interviews Karen Russell

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I think there is something fascinating about the wickedness that boys get up to in groups. I used to take these groups of high school students abroad, and I swear to god, the boys individually would be beyond sweet, but collectively they would transform and posses this evil energy.
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An Alternate Universe of Pop Culture: A Conversation with Teddy Wayne, Author of The Love Song of Jonny Valentine

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The Love Song of Jonny Valentine is a coming-of-age novel about a tween singer in the vein of Justin Bieber. Once again, Teddy Wayne examines the role pop culture plays in our lives. Who creates it? Who benefits from it? What is its effect on us?
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The Millions Conversation: Mark O’Connell on Viral Celebrity, Internet Weirdness, and the Phenomenon of the Epic Fail

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I do seem to be preoccupied by Internet weirdness. But who isn't fascinated by that stuff, really? (The answer to that rhetorical question is actually, no doubt, lots of normal people.)
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Getting Away with Murder: The Millions Interviews Ursula K. Le Guin

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I think to admit despair and to revel in it -- as many 20th- and 21st-century writers do -- is an easy way out.
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Topographies of Desire: The Millions Interviews Megan Kaminski

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One of my good friends is a very successful novelist. I was with her when she was approached by another (male) writer who was attempting to deride her work: “Aren’t all your books about the same thing?” My friend asked him what he meant by that. He replied without missing a beat — “Well, aren’t they all about women?”
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Graffiti and Glory Days: The Millions Interviews Adam Mansbach

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The "War on Graffiti" presaged and ushered in zero tolerance policy, prejudicial gang databases, quality of life offenses, epic incarceration — the whole way a generation has experienced law enforcement and personal freedom.
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The History of Humans is the History of Technology: The Millions Interviews Robin Sloan

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For me, the iPhone had become a toxic compulsion. It had completed its invasion and occupation of my interstitial time -- all those minutes riding the train, waiting in line, that used to be such fertile territory for daydreaming and storymaking.
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